


The Wrong Jumper

by redfiona



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, set after The Deathly Hallows
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-06
Updated: 2015-03-06
Packaged: 2018-03-16 13:15:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3489599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redfiona/pseuds/redfiona
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>George was cold and couldn’t sleep, so he grabbed the first jumper that came to hand.  Which jumper he grabbed had never mattered before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Wrong Jumper

It was two in the morning, but George was still awake. He didn't seem to be able to go to sleep properly anymore. It was all too quiet.

Before, when he couldn't go to sleep, he'd wake Fred up and they'd plot more mischief or, if Fred were truly, totally, completely asleep, George would lie back and let his breathing match his brother's and he'd be asleep within minutes.

It was too quiet in their room and he'd not got used to being the only one in their bunk-bed.

He'd moved back home for now, as much for a bit of comfort as anything. He couldn't quite cope with sleeping above the shop again yet. It’d come with time, and he thinks having them all under her roof is helping his Mum and Dad cope, as much as anything could.

George knew there was no point in just lying there, he'd not get to sleep for at least an hour yet if he did. He was trying to lay off the sleeping draught so he thought his best option would be to go downstairs, have a cup of hot chocolate and read something for a bit until he felt sleepy again.

He stepped off the ladder quietly enough that he didn't think he would have disturbed anyone else's sleep. He didn’t want to wake the whole house, no-one should be awake at two a.m. It was getting cold so he grabbed a jumper from the top of the pile. It probably wasn't clean, but it'd do, no-one else was going to see him.

George was well on his way to distracting himself, if not getting any closer to sleep when he heard something. There was a time that he'd known exactly what caused every creak in the Burrow, but now he was less sure about what could be causing them, particularly this one. The building still felt like it had been empty for too long, and he knew there were worse things out there than the family ghoul.

George stood up, cursing that he'd forgotten his wand up in the bedroom. He didn't think the book he was carrying was heavy enough to do any damage, but it was better than nothing.

He saw the light of the wand first, shedding the fuzzy blue-white light of a lumos spell. Thankfully he saw the rest of the person before he brought the book crashing down on their head, because he thinks braining his mother with a book would have been a terrible idea. The look on his mother’s face was something else. He doubted he looked half as shocked as his mother did about there being someone else awake.

"Fred?"

"No, Mum, it's me, George." He was worried, because for all he and Fred joked about it, their mother could normally tell them apart, and now it shouldn't be a problem.

"George, you idiot," she was shouting at him, and flailing away at him, but she was also crying and he didn't know how to stop her, all he knew was that he should try because he knew he'd done something wrong to cause this, not that he knew what he’d done so he just hugged her.

She calmed down eventually, her breathing evening out from the horrible gulps she'd been taking while she was crying. It might not even have been that long, but it felt that way to George because he was the one who'd upset her and he never wanted to do that. He and Fred had done it often enough, but it had never been deliberate. Sometimes they wound her up but that was different, it was never meant to hurt her.

"I am sorry, love," she said, squeezing him hard. "It's just in the dark, and with you wearing that."

He had no idea what he was wearing that could have caused all that, he was just wearing a jumper over his pyjamas. It was one of the ones his mother had knitted, and it might have been a red and gold monstrosity but it was also lovely and warm. He felt the thick wool between his fingers and thought and realised what the reason had to be. He'd picked up the jumper from his pile of clothes, and hadn't checked whose it actually was. It had never mattered before, he and Fred had always shared clothes, they neither of them minded that their clothes had been the same, they knew money was tight. That and it was brilliant for playing tricks on people. If they didn't have any distinguishing clothing, it made it so much easier for them to pretend to be each other and that had led to some truly brilliant pranks coming off.

There was so much mischief they never got the chance to make.

"Do you really think that Fred would be quietly reading a book if he was haunting us?" If Fred were haunting anywhere, George could have done with him coming to Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes, because he still hadn't sorted the Stinkwort Stinkbomb problem; it stank alright but it didn't wear off for two days which was a bit much. George tried not to think about Fred's workbench, which he still hadn't tried to put any order to, because it was Fred's bench and it seemed wrong somehow, because the shop was their thing, jointly, and he didn't want other people to forget that. He never would.

George didn't want to let his mother go.

He had no idea when she went from being an unstoppable force in his head to being someone who was his mother but still a human being just like him. George supposed it had something to do with growing up, but he blamed Percy and Percy's running off like that, because he'd never seen his mother worry like that before, it had aged her quickly. Percy was supposed to be the sensible one, the one that took after their mother, not like the rest of them who were starry-eyed like their father. It didn’t matter that George had mostly sort of forgiven Percy for the things he'd done to everyone else, George had lost enough to try and keep the siblings he still had close, even if Percy was prat, but he doesn't think that he'll ever forgive Percy for causing their mother so much upset for such a long time. It wasn't just uncertainty about whether he was safe, none of them had ever been safe with Voldemort alive, it was little silly things like Percy missing Bill's wedding, and all the added stress that gave their mother, who had already been having kittens trying to arrange it.

She felt more fragile in his arms now, and so much smaller than she had been, even Ginny had shot past their mother in height. George was holding on to her tightly, but he wasn't sure if that was to support her or if he was trying to hold himself up. He and Fred had always been able to rely on each other, for a second opinion, for moral support and for back-up when it went wrong like their plans did far too often.

He'd never been in trouble on his own before.

"How about I make us both a cup of hot chocolate?" His mother nodded. No-one ever expected it, or believed it without proof, but she'd taught all her sons how to cook and generally look after themselves and George made a decent cup of hot chocolate when he could be bothered.

George knew he'd get used to everything having changed eventually. He'd already had a few ideas for new products, and the itch to cause chaos was starting to come back, which he was taking as a good sign, because he hadn't wanted any havoc for a while, just peace and quiet to be able to sort everything out.

It wouldn't be the same, but it didn't need to be, he could carry on their tradition, knowing Fred would approve as long as there was enough mischief involved.  



End file.
